Computational & Algorithmic Thinking Competition

Computational & Algorithmic Thinking Competition

We are proud to announce that North Shore Coaching College is an Authorised Testing Centre for the Computational & Algorithmic Thinking (CAT) Competition, administered by the Australian Maths Trust (AMT), which is under the Trusteeship of the University of Canberra.

The CAT has four divisions: Upper Primary (Years 5–6), Junior (Years 7–8), Intermediate (Years 9–10) and Senior (Years 11–12). Most students will sit the paper that corresponds to their school year, but this is not compulsory.

Online registrations open on 5 February 2020, and close midnight on the 1 April 2020.

Is this competition suitable for my child?

The CAT competition is a one-hour problem solving competition designed to encourage student curiosity and promote multiple modes of thinking. Neither teachers nor students will need computer programming ability, but the competition will help identify students’ computer programming potential—something that they might not normally have the opportunity to demonstrate.

The competition is an ideal activity to encourage students to solve real-world problems. It is suitable for all students as it enables them to become more confident and willing to take on new challenges. The competition has a mixture of multiple-choice and integer answers and incorporates unique ‘three-stage tasks’ that encourage students to develop informal algorithms and apply them to test data of increasing size or complexity. The original problems are designed to be quick to solve and highly approachable, and range in difficulty from very easy to challenging. Some questions test the ability to perform procedures, others require logical thought, while the more challenging problems require the identification and application of algorithms.

Register now for your child to sit CAT 2020! Select a test date and the number of ticket you would like to purchase, then click Register Now.